


Mirrors

by the_reason_im_here



Category: Attack on Titan, Shingeki no Kyojin, aot, snk - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Comfort, Crying, Fluffy, Heartbreak, M/M, Multi, lots - Freeform, maybe????, not really jearmin, sorta bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-10
Updated: 2014-01-10
Packaged: 2018-01-08 04:11:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1128183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_reason_im_here/pseuds/the_reason_im_here
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Always. Always, always, always, as long as Armin had known Jean and Eren, they've been fighting. Why? Always fighting for no reason. It was stupid. Jean was starting to think so too. Why did they keep doing it?</p><p>Armin finally realizes the reason.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mirrors

**Author's Note:**

> Jesus. I'm new to this and I'm sorry of I did something weird. I'm actually quite proud of this. Hope you like it too!

"I know why you two hate each other. You know, you and Eren." It's Armin who's talking, looking at his lap.

"And why would that be?" Jean's asking with sarcasm dripping off of his words. He's sitting in a black chair, facing the matching one that the blonde is sitting in.

"Because you see yourselves in each other." He's looking at Jean expectingly.

Jean's brow furrows. "What do you mean?"

"You both wake up and you try not to look in the mirror because you hate to see the idiot that's screwed up countless numbers of times."

"You callin' me an idiot, Arlert?"

"You don't want to see your own face but, when you see each other, it's like seeing a reflection. An image, a face, you tried so hard to avoid and there it is, staring right back at you. It's infuriating. 

Seeing someone who had the same chances, who could've taken a different path, but instead ended up doing the same things, ending up at the same place. Same opportunities, same mistakes, though probably in different context. Berating each other, it's like telling yourself what you should've done right and all the things you've done wrong. You look at each other and think. 'Wow. Why are you so stupid?' Then you ask, 'Why was I so stupid?'."

"Clearly Yeager is the less intelligent one."

"You make so many comments to each other but that's not it really. You're trying to hurt each other, yes, but it's only because it's like hurting yourself."

"You've officially lost me."

"When you make a comment to each other it's just like saying it to yourself, only less direct. You call him stupid and, even though it hurts him, it hurts you worse. Because deep down, you aren't thinking about Eren. You're thinking about yourself. About how many times you've done something wrong. Over and over again you'd try and fail and you just couldn't ever learn. When he calls you ugly or horse face, it's not because he thinks you actually look bad. It's because when he wakes up and faces himself in the mirror, he sees the ugliest person in the whole world. 

You use each other like outlets for anger, but you two can't see how worse it's making everything. You're tearing at each other, and yourselves, so much that you're tearing into the bone."

Silence. A long silence. Jean is speechless.

"I left Eren, you know. I left because of how angry he was getting. We'd started out fine at first. I thought I'd make a couple side comments here and there, have some long, deep chats and we'd be okay. Oh, how I tried." He sighs.

Armin's eyes are going hollow while he's looking at the wall, thinking about the past. Now they're starting to water. 

"We really did love each other. It just got so bad. He'd yell at me, I knew he didn't mean it, but it still hurt. And it kept hurting and hurting and I one night I guess I didn't feel like he hurt back bad enough."

A couple of tears are sliding down his right cheek.

Jean's leaning in, concern lacing his words together. "Did he hit you?"

"No. Not ever. I never thought he would, and he never did. But I..." Armin's taking a shaky breath, too long of a breath.

"I called him a monster, Jean," He's whispering breathlessly.

"I called the person that I had loved most in this whole world a monster. Yelled it. Screamed it in his face! I called him a monster for tearing down everything I had when all he was trying to do was pick himself back up."

Armin's hands are now clenching into tight fists.

"I will never forget the burning rage that emitted off of him. His teeth grinding, knuckles clenching so hard they turned a sickly shade of white, his shoulders squared, and eyes burning right through my body. But it was not the intimidating amount of rage that haunts me. No. What haunts me is how he still cried, red hot tears streaming down his face. The heartbreak that his body so clearly presented by the way is breathing went ragged, as if trying to hold back sobs, his legs shaking. The way his voice quivered when he told me that he had always been a monster, and that he'd probably always be one."

Now Jean definitely does not know what to say. 

"I saw the anger build up in Eren over the years. His eyes burned bright but not with the light of a child. Fire formed in his ever widening gaze, his teeth and grin growing sharper and wider. Not with happiness, but with detest."

Armin's looking at him again, face furrowing and deadly serious.

"Your eyes aren't like that Jean. Your eyes are hollow, cold, distant. You hardly ever smile no matter what the cause may be. Just the usual, casual smirk. You get bags under your eyes and sometimes you get so little sleep that it looks like someone gave you a bruise for each eye. You get skinnier, sometimes slower."

Jean's squirming. No one has ever read him like this before, and he doesn't want them to.

"You're like me, Jean. You look in the mirror, so very tired, and try to let it slip away, to pass. You try to put a smile on your face but you can't. No matter how hard you try you just can't smile. Sometimes it isn't even worth the effort."

Another pause.

"Do you have trouble breathing sometimes?"

Jean's face is twisting into one of confusion from the sudden change in topic.

"Do ever have to go in the bathroom? Brace your palms on the sink and gasp in front of the mirror because the world is spinning and it feels like your falling and oh! There it is! That face. The face that makes you sick to your stomach. The same weak face that you know belongs to you,"

The blonde's words are going faster now.

"And you don't want to be weak! You just want so badly to be strong, to prove that you're really worth something,"

His voice is shaking. There are more tears. He's looking back down to his lap and fiddling with his thumbs.

"Eren doesn't yell as much anymore does he?"

He looks at Jean briefly. Jean says nothing.

"It's because he's getting better. He's learning how to get rid of the hate. You don't yell as much anymore either. But, it's not for the same reasons as Eren. It's because you don't think you can. You don't think you have enough air in your lungs or energy in your body to actually make the sound come out. Don't have enough energy to walk or talk or eat or laugh or smile and it just gets to the point where it's all so meaningless. The world spinning in circles always repeating the same pattern that just tears you down and wears you out and we're all just wondering if the spiral will ever end because so far it hasn't and we have no idea what's going to happen next and it's all just so terrifying."

It sounds like Armin is about to have a panic attack. Tears are streaming along his pale face, voice shaking and oh no. It isn't just his voice. His whole body is shaking.

"Truth is that we're all just lonely and scared and confused and we don't know where to go. In all of the haze of trying to find a way we all make some wrong turns and some of them are very, very wrong. Sometimes we come back the way we came. Sometimes we push our way through the fog. Sometimes we fall but eventually we get back up. Sometimes, we don't come back at all."

Jean's stomach is dropping from the last line that escaped from Armin's breathless tone. He's so ultimately compelled to give Armin a hug, to comfort him in any way, even if it's something minor such as this. He's dropping to his knees between Armin's legs, he is wrapping his arms around the blonde's waist, pulling him close. Armin's flinging his arms around Jean and sobbing into the taller boy's shoulder while Jean is petting his hair.

"We can't live like this. We're too broken, too new, too scared, too stupid, too reckless, too hateful. We can't keep fighting. Not any of us. Not Eren and I, neither you or Eren. We have to let some of these things go."

"I'm giving you a chance right now." Jean's whispering.

Armin's eyes are shutting tighter along with his grip on Jean's shirt. He's holding it like it's his last hope. He's sobbing for what seems like hours. Jean's own eyes are overflowing with tears of regret, and anger, and hopelessness. Armin is right. He's almost always right. And he needs this; they both need this. The comfort may not last forever, but in this moment, it's the best relief he has felt in years.


End file.
